*Five years later*
Maria was getting used to waking up before her alarm rings, it became a habit that she taught herself since middle school.
She turned off the alarm on her phone so that it won't disturb her fiancee that was sleeping next to her. Her attention turn to him laying besides her, snoring peacefully.
Using her hands to brush his blonde hair from his forehead, admiring his facial features and how good looking he is. She decided that she need to be on her way to work, that she shouldn't let him distract her.
She went inside the bathroom, brushed her teeth, took a shower, then cleaned her body off with her towel. Afterwards she wore her work clothes, and stepped outside the bathroom.
She love her job as a policewoman, she loves giving justice to people, and always making sure that things are in order. Even though the job requires majority of her time, that doesn't stop her from loving it more.
She head into the kitchen and made toast bread, smeared it with butter, she kept it on a paper plate and went to the fridge and brought out a jar of orange juice, which she poured inside a cup.
She took a bite out of the toast, and drank out of the orange juice. Her fiancee came outside, his hair sticking everywhere, which was something Maria found cute.
"Good morning babe," he said pecking her cheek, and going to take out a box of cereal from the kitchen cabinet, and took out a bowl along with it.
He prepared cereal for himself, and sat on the kitchen counter and was eating out of it.
Maria looked at him as he ate his cereal. He looked so hot, that she sometimes wish she could just eat him, which is a weird thing to think about, but she just can't help it.
He ran a hand through his hair and she instantly starting saw herself gawking at him. She met her fiancee Jeffery at a mixer that one of her friends organized.
Original she didn't want to go the mixer, but her friend dragged her lazy ass down to the place. That's how she met Jeffery who was also in her position as well.
They both realized that they didn't want to be at the mixer and decided to leave the place and head outside, in which they both had plenty conversations with each other about random things.
It wasn't until the fourth date that they both realized that they had feelings for each other, and they became official. He popped the question to her a month ago, at a restaurant with soft music playing in the backgroun. And she happily said yes.
The wedding date is set that month and they were preparing hard for it, she couldn't be more happier than she is already about the whole thing.
"Babe, later on today I am going hiking." He said jumping down from the kitchen counter, and going to wash the bowl in the sink.
"I don't think you should go, there has been report about about a wild animal prowling around the forest." She said worry laced in her voice.
"Don't worry, I will have a gun with me," he said trying to reassure her.
"They say that guns don't work on it."
"What is it a bear? We don't even have bears around these parts." He turn around from the sink and saw that she was still worried, he walked up to her and held her hands in his. He place a kiss on the back of her hand, caressing it with his thumb.
"Babe, you don't have to worry. I would be fine, and besides its been months since I went hiking. I just need to enjoy nature a little bit."
Maria finally agreed to what he said, and he kissed the top of her head. He checked the time on the digital clock that was hanging by the fridge area, he realize that she needed to go.
"Babe you need to go work, its getting late." He said, turning her around literally pushing her towards the door. Maria didn't want to go to work anymore, because she didn't want him to go hiking due to her fear of his safety. But she knows that she would get a query if she didn't go to work that day, so she just kissed his lips and told him goodbye, and got into her Volkswagen and drove off.
****
When she got to the city's police department, she got out of the car and went inside. She greeted the people at the front desk, and then went to her office and sat down on her chair.
As soon as she sat down on her chair, Anna Lincoln came in and dropped a file on her desk.
"Good morning Ms. Santos. There was murder down the next street, during the wee hours of the morning, apparently a woman by the name of Paula Jones, killed her husband and then tried escaping but her neighbors caught her and immediately called the police."
"How did the neighbors find out?" Maria asked leaning back on the chair.
"Well, according to the account the neighbor gave. There was an argument, a very loud argument that caused almost all the neighbors to wake up, and then there was silence which was odd because whenever the both of them start arguing it won't stop untill the crack of dawn. So she went to knock on the door, and find out what caused the silence and that was when Paula, bolted out of the door with such high speed that it knocked the neighbor down to the floor.
She began screaming for help, and that was when the other neighbors came out of their house, and tacked the Paula to the ground, they called the police and then got her arrested."
"Have you people interrogated her already?"
"We have tried to get her to talk on why she killed her husband, but she refuses to talk. And this is where we need your help on this one."
Maria got the memo and stood up from her chair, both her and Anna made their way to the interrogation room.
Paula was a very muscular woman, her hair was short and greasy, her face and hands had bruises on them.
Maria looked at Anna, and Anna took it as her que to leave the room. There was a moment of silence between both Maria and Paula, Maria walked up and took a sit on the opposite side of where Paula was seated.
Maria started asking her some few questions, talking about her past life, and Paula was answering also maintaining eye contact with her. It was when the question shifted to her murdering her husband was when she stopped talking and looked back to her bruised up knuckles.
Maria tried her best to pry her to open up, so that she can at least get answers from her. Nothing was coming forth. It was as if Paula decided to just shut up. Maria was contemplating giving up, and was about to head for the door, then Paula started talking.
"I gave this man everything." She started. "And what does he gives me in return, he goes behind my back, fuck my sister and gets the bitch pregnant. I found out about it, as I was snooping though his phone last night. I decided to confront him about it, and instead he got all defensive and started shouting at me, he was the one that picked up the knife and almost stabbed me, but I didn't let him do such a thing. Then I wrapped my hands around his neck in a fit of anger and chocked him to death." She folded and unfolded her hands together and tears began streaming down her face. "I-I didn't mean to do it, I didn't mean to kill him, I swear."
Maria couldn't help but feel pity for her, cheating isn't something that she would ever condone no matter what. However she committed a crime and needed to go to jail. But her sentence might not be that much due to it being self defence.
Maria muttered a small thank you to her, as she stood up and head for he door.
Before she left, Maria turned around asked her if she had a lawyer.
The woman shook her head no.
"You don't have to worry, a Public Defence Attorney come to you soon."
Then she headed outside, for some reason her gut instinct was telling her that Paula was lying, it sounded like she was trying to cover something up, but what could it possible be? Her thoughts were caught off when Anna came running towards her, she was speaking so fast that Maria could barely hear a single word that came out of her mouth.
"Calm down, Anna take in a deep breath and let it out."
Anna did as she was told. "Ok good, now speak."
"A report just came in from the forest ranger's office, that somebody was attack by a wild animal. And they sent in the pictures and..." Maria face went pale, she didn't want to believe it, she just hoped that it wasn't him Anna was talking about.
"It was Jeffery."